As a generalization, It seems that women look for a man, not for who he is but, who they think he could he could be, or someone to be molded, like taking on a house renovating project; where as a male will look for a woman who is exactly what he wants and is sometimes frustrated by a woman's constant need to reinvent themselves, I wonder if for males that painting a mental picture of the woman not as she is, but as she was is the visual side of love. In my case whenever I looked at my EX over the progressing years I only saw the 15 year old girl I fell in love with and it wasn't until 4-5months after our breakup that she looked up and she was suddenly 40 years old, that was the moment the magic died.